(Newser)
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Apparently Google's self-driving cars have yet to learn how to evade cops. One of its bubble-shaped autonomous vehicles was pulled over during a traffic stop in Mountain View, Calif., on Thursday, though it managed to avoid a ticket, reports NBC News. An officer spotted the vehicle traveling 24mph in a 35mph zone, with traffic backed up behind it, police say, per the San Jose Mercury News. "The officer stopped the car and made contact with the operators to learn more about how the car was choosing speeds along certain roadways," authorities say in a blog post, noting "it was lawful for the car to be traveling on the street."

According to the California Vehicle Code, the cars can operate on roads with speed limits of 35mph or under. However, "we've capped the speed of our prototype vehicles at 25mph for safety reasons," Google Self-Driving Car Project explains. "We want them to feel friendly and approachable, rather than zooming scarily through neighborhood streets." The project notes "people sometimes flag us down when they want to know more about our project," but "after 1.2 million miles of autonomous driving (that's the human equivalent of 90 years of driving experience), we're proud to say we've never been ticketed!" (Apple is working on its own self-driving cars.)

I think I know what caused the car to drive under the speed limit. The google car goes by the same type of speed limit info that my own GPS goes by and often my GPS reads the speed limit of a road that contradicts signs posted on a road.

SJay

Nov 13, 2015 11:49 AM CST

So the google car has some A-HOLE software installed in it.

Ezekiel 25:17

Nov 13, 2015 10:24 AM CST

How did it know to stop? In the future, can the cop just send an e-ticket? Will this wind up with a credit system like on, "5th element". When the car reaches zero credits, will it have to quickly return to home base?